HDM 12 Pro

Hi,

I'm new to the forum, a former Acronis user. Actually I still have Acronis TIH 2010 installed and semi-working... too frightened to even install any of the later versions so I've been looking for a replacement.

I'm trialling HDM 12 Pro at the moment, so hopefully can share experiences. I'm keen to try restoring into a virtual machine environment, not done that before, at least not outside of my former profession.

I've just completed my first HDM 12 Pro backup, 75Gb Win 7 O/S and it took less than 10 minutes to a separate local so it seems like it has good performance. The next task will be to try incrementals and some file backups of areas on my NAS.

BTW it might be useful but I could not find a way to HDM 12 Pro from the Paragon web site, however if you google it it shows up, or directly follow these links:

Product comparison:
http://www.paragon-software.com/home/hdm-professional/comparison.html

Info and download:
http://www.paragon-software.com/home/hdm-professional/

 

Ok so the first thing I am confused by is creating a differential to a full sector backup. I right-clicked on Hard Disk 0, clicked Backup Hard Disk, and the end backup size was 28Gb (from a 74Gb disk) within an "arc_nnnn" folder. It backed-up in about 10 mins. 5 mins later I then navigated to the Archives view, right-clicked on the archive and clicked Differential Backup. It performed the backup and the end result is "diff_nnnn" folder but also 28Gb...

Why would the differential be the exact same size as the original? What did I do wrong?

 

Make sure you are backing to a different partition. The backup archive should not be saved to the same partition, that is being backed up.

 

I had wondered that too but the source partition is on an SSD @74Gb and is the Windows 7 O/S. The target is L:\ which is an empty partition on a separate non-SSD disk.

 

I don't use differentials but in the HDM11 manual they refer to using the DifferentIal Backup Wizard. Have you tried that instead of just the right-click method?

 

I've just tried the wizard and it created exactly the same size archive.

 

I wonder if the SSD mechanism to shuffle the data around the disk so all the cells wear out evenly is causing the problem. This could cause Paragon to see the cells as changed even if the contents read is the same. Similar to doing a defrag on a mechanical disk.

Maybe a support request to Paragon would get a definitive answer to what is happening.

 

or you could try the differential backup on a regular hard drive partition and see if it works on that.

 

I tried with Macrium out of interest and it just works (33Gb followed by 240Mb incremental); Macrium V5 looks pretty good actually so I'll explore that as I can't find any solution to the bloated differential Paragon is creating. Peculiar that one.

 

That is all well but Paragon should still be able to make a differential! Did you follow the directions in the manual?

 

This problem should be reported to Paragon so they can find and correct whatever is going wrong - even if it is finger-trouble.

 

Hi Razza , LOL - must have posted the wrong link.

That is what happens when you are battling with windows 8.

If you haven't tried it yet - you are in for a treat

 

Well, this is the reason I do not try consumer previews. I read the news and saw the screen shots and the official microsoft video on windows 8. I was appalled to see the new metro desktop. I am pretty sure, unless microsoft is hell bent on committing hara kiri, they will give an option to change this to the old style desktop in the final release of windows 8.

in any case, I thought you were making fun of poor @oldcoder. I am sure he must have thought the same too. So what was the link you wanted him to see?

 

I wasn't intending to post the link here at all - had the wrong thing in the clipboard.

However, there is an amusing video published by lockergnome - it is trying to show MS what a mess they have made.

I don't think you can embed videos on this site :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4boTbv9_nU

It is definitely worth a watch.

 

I would expect they will be reading these forums and are most likely aware of the issue (or at least if they aren't they should take an interest).

Macrium V5 trial is working out very well after two weeks; it seems very solid and does everything I need so I won't be returning to Paragon.